It is frightening.

There are people who make public policies that are dissonant with their private principles.

How do I know this? you ask.

I have been the recipient of private principles (character, you would call it) that scalded my soul - fourth degree burns, I sustained.

Fourth-degree burns. Fourth-degree burns go through both layers of the skin and underlying tissue as well as deeper tissue, possibly involving muscle and bone. There is no feeling in the area since the nerve endings are destroyed.

It wasn’t just nerve endings that were destroyed; it was trust, equity, spirit.

And so, it seems incongruous to me,
me - flesh grafted back on to bones, patchy and stretched thin in places -
to hear a voice speaking up, indignation delivered publicly
on matters that scald souls
and to recognize it…

not as public defender
but as private offender.

And it is frightening, indeed.